Definitely going to pass on True Detective as there's no reason anybody should bother given the reviews. Life is way too short to watch what is essentially another detective story and one with only a 61/100 on Metacritic to boot. We live in a world that now produces an overwhelming amount of great television, so there's no reason to stick with something just because it has the same name as something else that you liked.

The same metric can obviously be applied to future seasons of American Horror Story, Fargo and The Missing. There's merely branding and some tonal qualities in common between subsequent seasons, but otherwise, it's essentially a different series every time it returns to our screens.

So, I figured I would try and group every pretty good-to-great drama currently on television on here into a few distinct categories and hopefully with the help of some other users we could get a go-to list going for each other and any passerbys. In particular, I want to answer the question of "Are there any shows as good as our dearly departed Mad Men?" when the answer is quite clearly an affirmative yes, even if people aren't exactly certain of what they are.

A: Television's Top Tier Dramas

- The Affair
- The Americans
- Better Call Saul
- Black Mirror
- The Fall
- Fargo
- Game of Thrones
- The Good Wife - for the record, I have never watched this
- Hannibal
- House of Cards
- The Knick
- Orange Is The New Black
- Rectify
- The Returned ("Les Revenants")
- Sherlock

This group ranges from clearly one of the best shows all-around right now (The Affair, The Americans, Rectify, etc.) to ones that are extremely impressive and do at least one aspect very well (The Knick's incredible directing by Soderbergh, for example, or House of Cards perfection as shallow popcorn fare).

B: Television's Next Batch

- Bloodline
- Broadchurch
- Call The Midwife
- Happy Valley - could be a Group A choice, I haven't investigated yet
- Manhattan
- Masters of Sex - could arguably be in Group A, imo
- The Missing
- Orphan Black - could argue for Group C given it's genre material, but Maslany's incredible performance elevates it. Probably was Top-Tier in Season 1.
- Outlander

This bunch includes shows that aren't quite there yet, may never quite be there or once were among the best and have dipped a bit in quality.

C: Well-Done Genre Shows (Mileage Will Vary)

- American Horror Story
- Daredevil - could rank much higher, I have yet to investigate this one
- Doctor Who
- Gotham
- Penny Dreadful
- Sleepy Hollow
- The Strain
- Vikings
- The Walking Dead

- Pretty self explanatory as your interest in the subject matter will have a much larger effect on whether or not you enjoy these shows. They're all currently flawed to an extent that I can't rank them much higher objectively. On a personal level, I could say I'm a big Doctor Who fan or think The Strain is perfect at what it does, but it wouldn't really be fair to these other programs in this group that people like for their own subjective reasoning whereas I can point out to specific reasons why something like Outlander is above the fray.

D: Network Television's Last Hurrah

- The Blacklist
- Empire (ew)
- Jane The Virgin
- Scandal

- Basically, anything left on the basic networks that gets a bit of favorable critical ink. Not much left here as cable has practically all of the gold nowadays. Do we even need this category for our discussion? Who has the time?

Gun to my head, I'd say Rectify is the best drama on television with The Affair and The Knick not too far behind.

Game of Thrones is hovering around there as well, but they don't really do anything new on that ship rather than just keeping it chugging along at a high whereas these other shows all have to try harder to keep the wheels in motion. Although, GoT is soon going to be running on the strands of what they haven't already adapted and what chapters from Martin's next book they have read in full before plunging into an end-run that will consist of them having to flesh out mere sketches of what happens from now until the saga's conclusion. It could get messy.

Emmy nominations will certainly see a repeat of Mad Men (and its fifth win), Game of Thrones and House of Cards all taking up three of the six spots. Breaking Bad and True Detective aren't eligible this time around, for obvious reasons, so that will free up at least two more spots (possibly three if those doing the nominating come to their senses about Downton Abbey by this point). Orange Is The New Black is a guarantee now that they've been rightfully forced to switch categories due to a new rule change involving the length of these programs. I figure The Affair is also a lock given its praise and Golden Globe win. That either leaves one spot for a surprise (Saul? Americans? return of The Good Wife?) or an awful rubber-stamp for Downton.

Definitely going to pass on True Detective as there's no reason anybody should bother given the reviews. Life is way too short to watch what is essentially another detective story and one with only a 61/100 on Metacritic to boot. We live in a world that now produces an overwhelming amount of great television, so there's no reason to stick with something just because it has the same name as something else that you liked.